[HN Gopher] Half a million kinksters can't be wrong
___________________________________________________________________
Half a million kinksters can't be wrong
Author : barry-cotter
Score : 180 points
Date : 2023-10-06 23:51 UTC (23 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (asteriskmag.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (asteriskmag.com)
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| Aella being open about her own experiences has been a huge
| inspiration. She gets a lot of hate, but somehow she lets it roll
| off her.
|
| For my part, I'm happy to see polyamory becoming more mainstream.
| The idea that we have to choose one partner for life is so
| indoctrinated into the fabric of society. It was wonderful
| discovering that there are a whole community of people who live
| happy lives without this.
|
| Aella's surveys help people make grounded and informed decisions
| about baseline behaviors. Most people don't want to talk about
| their true feelings, and when they do, they usually dress it up
| to make it socially acceptable. Polling large numbers of people
| is at least one antidote.
| orangepurple wrote:
| I'm happy that people are happy. Choices also have
| consequences. Choosing one partner for life is likely a relic
| of the evolutionary selection process.
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| Quite the opposite! Much work had to be done to force both
| husbands and wives into monogamy over the course of thousands
| of years. If anything, our evolutionary instincts are the
| other way around.
|
| Submitted for your consideration:
| https://twitter.com/robkhenderson/status/1708600990658711685
| orangepurple wrote:
| I read both posts. I'm not buying the conspiracy theory
| that monogamy is a psychological operation to lure men into
| a sense of duty and to accept responsibilities. However, if
| it is true, then the writer builds a strong case against
| polygamy or polyamory. The writer indicates that rulers of
| ancient civilizations struggled with apathetic hedonistic
| polygamous or polyamarous men.
| temporarara wrote:
| Indeed, making men willing to work hard to provide for
| their family has been pretty awesome psyop. I really
| can't see any downsides if civilized society is the
| ultimate goal. I can just imagine how it feels when the
| ruler has a big harem and you don't really have a
| realistic chance for creating a family, but I don't think
| it makes you work harder once you realize it.
| krapp wrote:
| >Choosing one partner for life is likely a relic of the
| evolutionary selection process
|
| If anything, it's a relic of the Abrahamic faiths and their
| influence over Western cultures. Many other cultures have
| practiced polygamy since antiquity.
| paulddraper wrote:
| First, that's a funny thing to say because Abraham himself
| had a concubine (Agar), who bore him a son (Ishmael). And
| his grandson Jacob married Leah and Rebecca.
|
| Second, traditional polygamy was never akin to modern
| polyamory. It included contract/commitment, not short-term
| engagements.
| WitCanStain wrote:
| The same could be said for traditional monogamy.
| [deleted]
| syndicatedjelly wrote:
| How would you explain the many animals that have monogamous
| relations? Is it from roosting around too many churches?
| orangepurple wrote:
| The government needed to give them a sense of duty and
| responsibility to save them from apathy (see the comment
| linking to the twitter thread and read the first 2 posts)
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| There was a wonderful passage in _American Gods_ about
| this phenomenon:
|
| -----
|
| "Remember," she [Easter] said to Wednesday [Odin], as
| they walked, _" I'm_ rich. I'm doing just peachy. Why
| should I help you?"
|
| "You're one of us," he said. "You're as forgotten and as
| unloved and unremembered as any of us. It's pretty clear
| whose side you should be on."
|
| They reached a sidewalk coffeehouse, went inside. There
| was only one waitress, who wore her eyebrow ring as a
| mark of caste, and a woman making coffee behind the
| counter. The waitress advanced on them, smiling
| automatically, sat them down, took their orders.
|
| Easter put her slim hand on the back of Wednesday's
| square gray hand. "I'm telling you," she said, "I'm doing
| _fine._ On my festival days they still feast on eggs and
| rabbits, on candy and on flesh, to represent rebirth and
| copulation. They wear flowers in their bonnets and they
| give each other flowers. They do it in my name. More and
| more of them every year. In _my_ name, old wolf. "
|
| "And you wax fat and affluent on their worship and their
| love?" he said, dryly.
|
| "Don't be an asshole." Suddenly she sounded very tired.
| She sipped her mochaccino.
|
| "Serious question, m'dear. Certainly I would agree that
| millions upon millions of them give each other tokens in
| your name, and that they still practice all the rites of
| your festival, even down to hunting for hidden eggs. But
| how many of them know who you are? Eh? Excuse me, miss?"
| This to their waitress.
|
| She said "You need another espresso?"
|
| "No, my dear. I was just wondering if you could solve a
| little argument we were having over here. My friend and I
| are disagreeing over what the word 'Easter' means. Would
| you happen to know?"
|
| The girl stared at him as if green toads had begun to
| push their way between his lips. Then she said, "I don't
| know about any of that Christian stuff. I'm a pagan."
|
| The woman behind the counter said, "I think it's like
| Latin or something for 'Christ has risen' maybe."
|
| "Really?" said Wednesday.
|
| "Yeah, sure," said the woman. "Easter. Just like the sun
| rises in the east, you know."
|
| "The risen son. Of course -- a most logical supposition."
| The woman smiled and returned to her coffee grinder.
| Wednesday looked up at their waitress. "I think I _shall_
| have another espresso, if you do not mind. And tell me,
| as a pagan, who do _you_ worship? "
|
| "Worship?"
|
| "That's right. I imagine you must have a pretty wide-open
| field. So to whom do you set up your household altar? To
| whom do you bow down? To whom do you pray at dawn and at
| dusk?"
|
| Her lips described several shapes without saying anything
| before she said, "The female principle. It's an
| empowerment thing. You know."
|
| "Indeed. And this female principle of yours. Does she
| have a name?"
|
| "She's the goddess within us all," said the girl with the
| eyebrow ring, color rising to her cheek. "She doesn't
| need a name."
|
| "Ah," said Wednesday, with a wide monkey grin, "so do you
| have mighty bacchanals in her honor? Do you drink blood
| wine under the full moon, while scarlet candles burn in
| silver candleholders? Do you step naked into the sea-
| foam, chanting ecstatically to your nameless goddess
| while the waves lick at your legs, lapping your thighs
| like the tongues of a thousand leopards?"
|
| "You're making fun of me," she said. "We don't do any of
| that stuff you were saying." She took a deep breath.
| Shadow suspected she was counting to ten. "Any more
| coffees here? Another mochaccino for you, ma'am?" Her
| smile was a lot like the one she had greeted them with
| when they had entered.
|
| They shook their heads, and the waitress turned to greet
| another customer.
|
| "There," said Wednesday, "is one who 'does not have the
| faith and will not have the fun.' Chesterton. Pagan
| indeed. So. Shall we go out onto the street, Easter my
| dear, and repeat the exercise? Find out how many passers-
| by know that their Easter festival takes its name from
| Eostre of the Dawn? Let's see -- I have it. We shall ask
| a hundred people. For every one that knows the truth, you
| may cut off one of my fingers, and when I run out of
| them, toes; for every twenty who don't know you spend a
| night making love to me. And the odds are certainly in
| your favor here -- this is San Francisco, after all.
| There are heathens and pagans and Wiccans aplenty on
| these precipitous streets."
|
| Her green eyes looked at Wednesday. They were, Shadow
| decided, the exact same color as a leaf in spring with
| the sun shining through it. She said nothing.
|
| "We _could_ try it, " continued Wednesday. "But I would
| end up with ten fingers, ten toes, and five nights in
| your bed. So don't tell me they worship you and keep your
| festival day. They mouth your name, but it has no meaning
| to them. Nothing at all."
|
| Tears stood out in her eyes. "I know that," she said,
| quietly. "I'm not a fool."
|
| -----
|
| Just as in the book's depiction, your parent comment has
| managed to confuse a practice that a culture older than
| Christianity imposed on it with one that Christianity
| imposed on the older culture.
| bentley wrote:
| That passage is fascinating in that it itself confidently
| makes statements about history that are based more on
| supposition than evidence.
|
| For starters, it's true that the name "Easter" probably
| comes from a Germanic goddess, but in most other
| languages the name of the holiday is related to Pesach,
| the Hebrew word for Passover. (As a holiday, Easter is
| directly descended from Passover, as that's when Jesus
| died.)
|
| The English name for Easter derives only indirectly from
| the pagan goddess, because Germanics used the name Easter
| for the springtime month of April. Similar to how Good
| Friday took its name from the day of the week, not
| because it had any relation to the worship of Frigg.
|
| Easter eggs aren't a "fertility ritual" either--they came
| to Easter via Persian New Year celebrations.
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > That passage is fascinating in that it itself
| confidently makes statements about history that are based
| more on supposition than evidence.
|
| It's not making statements about history. Elsewhere in
| the book it states that the Ancient Egyptians traveled to
| America, which is why Thoth has a presence there. It's a
| fictional world.
|
| > [Easter eggs] came to Easter via Persian New Year
| celebrations.
|
| Is this something we know? I had the impression that
| Easter eggs were attested for the Kievan Rus.
| bongoman37 wrote:
| [dead]
| [deleted]
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > If anything, it's a relic of the Abrahamic faiths and
| their influence over Western cultures.
|
| What? Monogamy was already mandatory in Western culture
| (meaning classical Greek and Roman culture) before there
| was _any_ influence from Judaism. And Jewish scripture is
| explicitly polygamous.
|
| Monogamy in Christianity is obviously the result of the
| influence of Western culture on Christianity and not the
| other way around. For Judaism that is not so obvious, since
| it, unlike Christianity, at least predates Classical Roman
| culture.
|
| Meanwhile, in the third Abrahamic faith, Islam, monogamy is
| not even an element of the faith _today_.
| orasis wrote:
| Roman monogamy was perhaps largely administrative. When a
| man eventually became a citizen through his military
| service he was only allowed to confer that citizenship to
| one wife and bloodline.
|
| Given how radical their "immigration" system already was
| it would have been untenable to allow citizenship for
| multiple wives.
| xyzelement wrote:
| // relic of the evolutionary selection process.
|
| I am guessing at what you mean here... Is forming a couple
| that is oriented to raising kids no longer an evolutionary
| advantage?
| lostgame wrote:
| I am truly happy to see this as well.
|
| As a woman who's been extremely successfully poly for almost a
| decade, I feel like I fight against the grain whenever I am
| able to explain how well it works for myself and the other
| women I'm with...with various relationship styles in there.
|
| It's sad how skeptical and dismissive folks are, and how
| unwilling they are to see how it can work for some, but not
| all.
|
| The lessons of radical honesty and communication skills that
| come from practicing polyamory can improve monogamous
| relationships as well. I feel it's just too challenging for
| some.
| [deleted]
| xyzelement wrote:
| // Aella's surveys help people make grounded and informed
| decisions about baseline behaviors
|
| Separate from this topic, I find that understanding of what's
| "mainstream" is completely irrelevant to informing my own
| decision making.
|
| It is mainstream to have a gambling addiction, be overweight,
| be heavily in debt, etc. The fact that something is "normal"
| doesn't tell you it's good.
| InSteady wrote:
| I don't think its surprising that people aren't deciding what
| turns them on based on population statistics. I'm no expert,
| but the consensus of what I've read and heard is that by and
| large people aren't deciding what turns them on, period. They
| may choose to constrain their behavior or not act on certain
| desires based on what society finds acceptable, but that does
| not really change their sexuality.
|
| However, if you feel alone, ashamed, afraid to reach out to
| others, etc, having a sense for how common certain kinks are
| can be extremely useful information. The objective of these
| statistics isn't to tell you what sexual behaviors are good
| or bad based on popularity... the very definition of a kink
| is that it is uncommon.
| jncfhnb wrote:
| I won't claim without data that polyamorous couples do worse on
| divorce rates, but most people's mental story of polyamory is a
| couple decided they want to be polyamorous, and then one feels
| insecure and the other one leaves them for the third.
|
| Polyamory doesn't spark disapproval so much as skepticism.
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| I thought this would be the default case too, but it's
| surprisingly nuanced.
|
| One red flag is anyone wanting to open a monogamous
| relationship that isn't more-or-less rock solid. Polyamory
| isn't something to try if you're uncertain about your current
| monogamous partner.
|
| The ideal case is for someone to go into the dating pool as
| openly polyamorous. But this will take a couple more
| generations, I think. Most people don't have the opportunity,
| because the idea that we need to choose a single partner has
| been hammered into us from the moment we were born. So I'm
| sympathetic to people who want to put in the work of
| exploring whether polyamory is possible within the bounds of
| an existing relationship.
|
| The most important thing is communication. There will be
| misunderstandings, but at no point should someone feel like
| something is being hidden from the other. That's different
| than respecting each person's individual relationships - one
| is underhanded, the other is a social contract.
|
| This isn't directly related to your point, but
| https://www.unicorns-r-us.com/ was an interesting read.
| [deleted]
| jncfhnb wrote:
| It seems inevitable though. You can't simultaneously be
| invested in a relationship and indifferent to its nature.
| This article points out a ton of issues and largely
| suggests just awkwardly independently dating other people
| as safer. Like "if you agree that everyone's free then
| everyone's free". But... no that sounds dumb to me. I would
| not bet on such myriad bonds holding up in times of
| difficulty. Surely it can happen. But I just don't buy it
| as a sensible strategy
| paulddraper wrote:
| It's like that scene from Arrested Development.
|
| https://youtu.be/7NnW7AA9STg?si=r32PdL56dR7NVQL4&t=39
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Monogamous divorce rates are ~50% first marriage, ~60-70%
| second marriages, ~70-74% third marriages. People are already
| polyamorous, just masking it due to social convention and
| signaling.
| est31 wrote:
| There is multiple forms/degrees of monogamy.
|
| Some animals have lifelong monogamy where they have one
| fixed breeding partner (many birds). Some animals have
| couples cooperate and raise offspring for a breeding season
| and then look for another partner in the next season,
| others mate for multiple seasons.
|
| https://web.stanford.edu/group/stanfordbirds/text/essays/Mo
| n...
| jncfhnb wrote:
| Cheating on someone or even being an advantageous position
| where you can have more than one lover with your partner(s)
| having no recourse isn't the definition of polyamory these
| folks are working with.
| noirbot wrote:
| I'm not sure your conclusion follows from your data.
| Sequential monogamy isn't polyamory. There seems to be
| strong evidence that, given autonomy, most people aren't
| monogamous for 20+ years, but it doesn't follow that they'd
| stay with their first partner if there wasn't a social
| stigma against leaving them even if they could have sexual
| relations outside of that relationship.
|
| My hypothesis is that most people are generally monogamous,
| but not to the same person indefinitely, and that
| transition is either marked by divorce/breakup if socially
| monogamous, or an odd transition period where they haven't
| really broken up with their last committed partner but have
| functionally done so if they're polyamorous.
|
| I've certainly seen both ends of this specific spectrum
| work for those involved, but it seems about as general as
| anything else about human sexuality.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| It's not just serial monogamy, it's also infidelity,
| having an emotional relationship with someone without it
| turning into infidelity, etc. Agree the single data point
| alone wrt divorce rate does not lead us to my thesis, but
| in aggregate, it appears humans are not made for long
| term aggressive monogamy. That is what I meant by "People
| are already polyamorous"; they already want to or do love
| (or some other combination of relationships stronger than
| platonic friendship) more than one person at a time.
| noirbot wrote:
| But I'm not sure even that follows. Most of the folks I
| know who got a divorce or cheated on their partner
| generally weren't in love with both people at the same
| time. Obviously it's hard to ever get an true answer on
| some of this, since it's hard to definitively say if
| you're in love with someone or not, but almost by
| definition, infidelity in monogamy isn't polyamory. I
| just had a friend who was in a polyamorous/open
| relationship go through a bitter divorce because of the
| way that a new partner was brought into the group and
| feelings of betrayal and infidelity that that caused.
|
| Polyamory isn't some sort of magic flag that makes things
| not infidelity, and most outwardly monogamous people who
| are in relationships with multiple people aren't closeted
| polyamorous people, they're just selfish/abusive
| partners.
| scythe wrote:
| Only about a quarter of divorce is related to infidelity.
| dahart wrote:
| > The idea that we have to choose one partner for life is so
| indoctrinated into the fabric of society.
|
| I used to think this and remember my friends and I starting to
| have this idea that marriage is a social construct in high
| school and college as we tried on our philosopher hats. A
| little later I read an interesting book called Sperm Wars [1]
| that largely tried to line up the results of scientific papers
| and behavioral surveys with attitudes and narratives about sex.
| They had what was a compelling argument for me that the
| cultural ideas behind monogamy are a social _rationalization_
| for what we'd be largely doing anyway. In other words, they
| argued that from as far as they could tell, we tend to have
| serially monogamous pairings, and the culture and religion
| views on marriage are just after-the-fact explanations for it,
| not the primary cause of it. There are, of course, lots of
| other species on our planet that also tend toward serial
| monogamy, and don't have the same social constructs that humans
| do.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sperm_Wars
| kibwen wrote:
| Of course, worth mentioning that arguing in favor of de-
| stigmatizing polyamory does not imply stigmatizing monogamy.
| If people are naturally monogamous, and therefore produce
| social structures that reflect monogamy, then it means there
| should be no fear whatsoever in de-stigmatizing polyamory.
| SergeAx wrote:
| Marriage is not a social construct, it is an economical and
| legal institution.
| dahart wrote:
| Hehe aren't laws and all 'institutions' social constructs,
| by definition? ;) If economic and legal institutions
| summarized marriage, then I'd lean toward it being a social
| construct. But what about religious marriages, marriages
| for love, secret marriages, pre-law marriages, marriage
| traditions in all countries globally, some of which don't
| have marriage laws, pair-bonding and cohabitation without
| legal marriage, etc.? I guess I feel like people choose
| partners and intimacy, regardless of laws, and the book I
| read convinced me that humans gently tend toward having one
| partner at a time, but obviously not always, and obviously
| among a wide distribution of behaviors.
| postmodest wrote:
| I feel like it's just much more likely that a love triangle
| will end up with unbalanced weights than a love pair. Kind of
| by definition.
|
| And in a world where the relationship is procreative, the
| multi-decade long shared task demands stability.
| whaleofatw2022 wrote:
| It -can- be unbalanced.
|
| I've seen women and men with a 'hierarchy' of partners, and
| they all know it (these were typically D/s relationships as
| well, so it was at least consentual [0])
|
| I've also seen cases where people just like to have a
| routine to go through. My partner and I are no longer
| practicing poly, but even when it started they were, aside
| from special occasions, just a one night a week thing. It
| worked out well because it was a night I worked late, so we
| couldn't do anything anyway.
|
| But there were times it was a little unbalanced one way or
| another, really though as long as you can communicate, it
| can get worked out.
|
| As far as procreation/etc, Aside from Mormon and other
| polygamous cultures/religions, it doesn't NOT work out.
|
| Or, I've seen scenarios where a polyamorous relationship
| allowed couples to have children where they could not
| otherwise.
|
| I think harem builders create lots of animosity tho.
|
| [0] well, parts were. Others were abusive.
| latchkey wrote:
| > _I'm happy to see polyamory becoming more mainstream._
|
| I've only ever met one single couple where true polyamory
| worked over the long term, and they just celebrated 20 years
| together. They are an odd awesome couple that are extremely
| well matched. [They don't have kids.]
|
| I even worked for Kink[dot]com (NSFW) for 4 years and I've
| thrown hundreds of sex parties with hundreds of people going
| bonkers all night long (and often into the next day). I've
| tried it myself in a few relationships and I'm happy that
| people experiment with it.
|
| But, I strongly doubt it'll ever be mainstream. I'm pretty
| convinced at this point that it'll always remain a fringe
| fantasy for the majority of the population. Especially outside
| of the bubble of certain very small parts of the world.
| orasis wrote:
| I blame "The Ethical Slut" for a lot of the strange ideas
| people have around non-monogamy.
|
| It gave people a whole bunch of rules and ideals for
| polyamory to replace their rules and ideals around monogamy.
| Rather than freedom, it's just trading one dogma for another.
|
| The Esther Perel approach of couples consciously co-creating
| their uniquely ideal relationship structure seems much
| healthier and applicable to broader society.
| whaleofatw2022 wrote:
| A self confessed sociopath involved in a an area kink/poly
| scene once described it to me as "mostly two women
| justifying their actions".
|
| There are far better books out there now thankfully.
| jrm4 wrote:
| Agreed; Nassim Taleb's "Lindy" seems instructive here.
| RangerScience wrote:
| Something I _think_ I 've noticed is that our modern culture
| assumes exclusivity after the first date; contrast with (my
| very poorly understanding of), say, the Victorian era, where
| multiple suitors were common. People end up turning to poly
| because we don't _do_ that early multiple-suitors period.
| xyzelement wrote:
| I have not encountered any expectations of exclusivity
| after a first date.
|
| There is sometimes an assumption that you are not banging
| other people once you start sleeping w someone but even
| that is usually best left to confirmation.
| latchkey wrote:
| > I have not encountered any expectations of exclusivity
| after a first date.
|
| I have!
| hn_go_brrrrr wrote:
| > I even worked for Kink[dot]com (NSFW) for 4 years
|
| Interesting! Doing what?
| latchkey wrote:
| Built their whole IT infrastructure from the ground up.
| spondylosaurus wrote:
| Out of curiosity, when you say "couple" do you mean a literal
| couple where both partners have other partners, or couple as
| in a throuple/fourple/etc?
|
| I'm not poly so idk if people use couple beyond the literal
| sense of Exactly Two. (I also don't know if poly people
| actually say "throuple" or if that's just something the rest
| of us made up to amuse ourselves, lol.)
| latchkey wrote:
| > _do you mean a literal couple where both partners have
| other partners_
|
| this
| spondylosaurus wrote:
| Cool, thanks for clarifying!
| pclmulqdq wrote:
| Polyamory seems to be a tremendous amount of work that also
| requires a high degree of emotional maturity. You are
| balancing multiple intimate, emotional relationships with
| other people. I doubt that most people with the fantasy are
| interested in maintaining the reality for a very long time.
| RangerScience wrote:
| Oh, what's the joke - people think poly is just orgies
| orgies orgies, but in _achtuality_ it 's like nine hours of
| talking for every hour of sex...
|
| ...and then the punchline is that you should be doing that
| in a mono relationship, too.
| stevekemp wrote:
| People that have done it for significant amounts of time
| realize it's not even the talking that is hard - it's the
| scheduling.
|
| So many conflicting calendars, and scheduling issues to
| deal with. Especially if some/all of you have children..
| RangerScience wrote:
| Something-something the _actual_ poly flag is the google
| calendar logo in the poly flag rainbow
| _trampeltier wrote:
| I think so too. I'm "just" in a open relationship and just
| this already does need so much more trust to my partner,
| than in a normal relationship.
| bigDinosaur wrote:
| Critics frequently express the notion the polyamory is
| precisely the opposite of emotional maturity i.e. willing
| or being able to commit to a single other person (which
| inherently does mean a certain sort of sacrifice, not
| having a cake and eating it too style).
| yipbub wrote:
| What do the critics have to say about why they think
| people should be motivated to commit to a single other
| person in the long term?
| animal_spirits wrote:
| If you plan on having children, having parents in a
| stable monogamous relationship fosters a secure
| attachment in the child.
| mock-possum wrote:
| If having no parents is awful, single parentage is rough
| but barely navigable with money, and two parents seems to
| work pretty well... why would three parents not continue
| the pattern? Why shouldn't a throuple be as much an
| improvement over a couple as a couple is over a single?
| defrost wrote:
| And yet there is much precedent for having a village
| raise children.
|
| Many couples see the death of one partner, many couples
| lack a full and complete skill set to teach children all
| that they might want or need to to know, etc.
|
| Leaving communities and extended families out of the
| picture is some post WWII idealised nuclear family
| fantasy.
| throw0101c wrote:
| > _And yet there is much precedent for having a village
| raise children._
|
| But are all those other people on the same 'level' of
| attachment for the child, or is there a 'hierarchy'?
|
| Further, not that having community is bad, but it can
| 'devolve' into tribal/clan thinking, which is probably
| not good for society as a whole (can lead to nepotism,
| which is generally highly correlated with corruption) and
| something the West is relatively unique in 'breaking out'
| of:
|
| * https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/10/jo
| seph-...
|
| * https://archive.ph/e7DJX
| lolinder wrote:
| It's not a fantasy in a good way: most parents (even in
| stable relationships) would prefer to have more support
| than they get. Communities are getting weaker as third
| spaces disappear, and people are far more likely to have
| to move far away from extended family (or have extended
| family move far away from them). The reality of the
| modern world is that the two parents and paid caretakers
| are often all that's available.
| SergeAx wrote:
| > Polyamory seems to be a tremendous amount of work that
| also requires a high degree of emotional maturity
|
| So is real friendship (not like in "we just having fun
| together eventually").
| kibwen wrote:
| _> I 've only ever met one single couple where true polyamory
| worked over the long term, and they just celebrated 20 years
| together._
|
| I recently found out that some elderly friends of mine have
| been in a polyamorous relationship for almost a decade (we
| should note that there is inherent bias in finding successful
| polyamorous relationship, since the social stigma means that
| people are likely to hide it).
|
| This couple has been married for 50 years and raised two
| children. When the wife retired, she decided she was done
| having sex for the rest of her life. The husband still wanted
| to have sex, so they agreed that he would get a girlfriend (a
| widow of the same age bracket). By all accounts it appears to
| be working out for all involved.
| siva7 wrote:
| I can't even wrap my head around the idea you decide you're
| done with sex for the end of your life.
| latchkey wrote:
| I can, even as a man. As women get older, sex can become
| extremely painful for a variety of reasons. Who knows,
| maybe her partner was also very large sized. So yea, if
| it isn't bringing you enjoyment any more, why do it?
| throwaway22032 wrote:
| As far as I'm concerned this whole "culture war" is just short
| termism vs long termism.
|
| You can be childfree, polyamorous, body positive, whatever, and
| enjoy your youth.
|
| In older age, your 50s and 60s onwards say, your health, your
| partner, your family become the basis of your life. It's the
| ultimate "fuck around and find out".
| Georgelemental wrote:
| > For my part, I'm happy to see polyamory becoming more
| mainstream.
|
| How many children do you have? (i.e. are you passing on your
| lifestyle to the next generation?)
| klyrs wrote:
| > (i.e. are you passing on your lifestyle to the next
| generation?)
|
| Memetic reproduction need not coincide with biological
| reproduction. Of the non-monogamists I know, almost all of
| them come from monogamous pairings.
| paulddraper wrote:
| Dismissing a multi-millenia multi-cultural fundamental norm as
| "indoctrination" severely downplays the collective learning of
| uncountable generations.
|
| There is a common view of cultural norms as at worst tyrannical
| or at best _random_ and _arbitrary,_ rather than the
| sophisticated and curated product of billions of human lives.
|
| Social iconoclasts dismiss organized religion, marriage, sexual
| norms, social duty, gender roles, and cultural traditions. Base
| human psychology and sociology must bow to their intellect and
| are theirs to shape as they choose.
|
| > For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous,
| boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents,
| unthankful, unholy,
|
| > Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers,
| incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good,
|
| > Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than
| lovers of God;
|
| > Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof:
| from such turn away.
|
| > For of this sort are they which creep into houses, and lead
| captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers
| lusts,
|
| > Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the
| truth.
| orasis wrote:
| Note that these cultural norms evolved prior to modern birth
| control, STI testing/treatment, and peak population.
|
| Birth control is a radical invention and it is shocking that
| it hasn't led to even more rapid cultural change than it has.
|
| One also needs to separate generalized cultural knowledge
| from individual knowledge. As people mature, they should tend
| to individuate and discover "what works for them" vs "what
| works for society".
|
| That individual knowledge can be bootstrapped on cultural
| knowledge, but ultimately we may each need to reject aspects
| of our culture in order to discover our unique path.
| rayiner wrote:
| > That individual knowledge can be bootstrapped on cultural
| knowledge, but ultimately we may each need to reject
| aspects of our culture in order to discover our unique
| path.
|
| But we're not unique individuals. We're 8 billion copies of
| two sexes of human animal, and pretty much everyone falls
| into a handful of archetypes and social roles.
| orasis wrote:
| Seeking to collapse the unique contexts and interplay
| between 8 billion individuals is incredibly dangerous,
| leading to things like command-and-control economies,
| socialism, and genecide.
|
| The information surface area and processing power of 8
| billion people far exceeds the few bits representing your
| "handful of archetypes and social roles".
|
| Anyone who believes that Western civilization has been
| largely functional should soundly reject these ideas and
| agree that individuation is a fundamentally Good Thing.
| rayiner wrote:
| Western civilization is literally in the middle of wiping
| itself out. People have become so individualistic and
| self-absorbed that they cannot even perpetuate their own
| civilization and need to import people from the Middle
| East and Africa to avoid disappearing. The phrase "jump
| the shark" comes to mind.
| 8note wrote:
| Is it individualization that's done that, or rentier
| capitalism?
|
| Individuals in the western capitalist society spend most
| of their time making capitalists of all sorts exceedingly
| wealthy, rather than spending most of their time on
| themselves.
|
| Give us 4 - 6 months off a year like our ancestors had,
| and we'll have plenty of children
| dwaltrip wrote:
| All highly developed societies have birth rates below
| replacement. Nothing special about western nations there.
| callalex wrote:
| The elephant in the room is that "highly developed" is a
| euphemism for "women are treated equally and have
| rights".
| rayiner wrote:
| I think that's more of a confounding correlation. America
| had birth rates above 3 when it landed a man in the moon.
| And Europe was "highly developed" before birth rates
| started collapsing in the 1970s. Several highly
| successful American subgroups, such as Muslims and
| Mormons, still have birth rates above replacement.
|
| And Asia has its own distinct issue, which is that
| development coincided with population control evangelism
| from the west.
| andelink wrote:
| You've mentioned Mormonism twice now as an example of
| successful monogamous societies but it should be noted
| that the growth rate of the church has become negative.
| I'd be amazed if the LDS church is still around in any
| meaningful way 30 years from now. It's hardly meaningful
| now.
| dwaltrip wrote:
| As far as I can tell, it's one of the more robust
| sociological correlations that has been established
| worldwide. Fertility rates are dropping on every
| continent, and the drops are strongly correlated with
| economic development. See links below, they seem pretty
| damning.
|
| And yes, it begun in the second half of the 20th century,
| but I don't think that makes it spurious.
|
| I wouldn't be surprised if western cultural influence
| played a meaningful role, but I can't imagine that
| explaining the entire phenomenon.
|
| ---
|
| * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_and_fertility (see
| the graph at the top)
|
| * https://ourworldindata.org/fertility-rate#total-
| fertility-ra...
|
| * https://www.statista.com/statistics/1034075/fertility-
| rate-w...
| irrational wrote:
| Is it a norm? I view all forms of having more than one
| significant other as being forms of poly. Office spouse,
| mistress, side boyfriend, sexting other people, etc. I think
| poly relationships are very common.
|
| If you want to quote from the Bible:
|
| But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust
| after her hath committed adultery with her already in his
| heart.
|
| So even looking at porn or thinking sexual thoughts about
| anyone else is engaging in a poly relationship. By that
| standard, nearly everyone is in a poly relationship.
| jandrese wrote:
| That seems overly reductionist and devalues the entire
| concept of polyamory. Thoughts and actions are not the same
| and can not be treated as the same. Your viewpoint veers
| into thoughtcrime territory.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| Well sure. Christianity invented thoughtcrime. Before
| Christianity, the essence of religion was observing the
| appropriate rituals at the appropriate times, with
| Christianity it became _what you truly believe in your
| heart of hearts._
| barrysteve wrote:
| By that standard, everyone is a sinner.
| twodave wrote:
| Well you don't have to use that passage to know that's
| exactly what the Bible teaches--"For all have sinned..."
| Rom 3:23.
|
| Or, later in the same letter, Paul speaks about his own
| struggles:
|
| "For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in
| my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but
| not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good
| I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on
| doing." Rom 7:18-19
| nick-of-time wrote:
| That's the point, it's the entrance to their sales
| funnel. Convince people that they're dirty and broken,
| then sell them the cure.
| paulddraper wrote:
| Not a single Christian would disagree with that
| statement.
| xyzelement wrote:
| I think you are conflating succumbing to a vice (eg porn)
| and orienting your life around an identity (eg poly)
| CobrastanJorji wrote:
| Interestingly, Catholicism sees the former (doing the bad
| thing but agreeing that it is bad and that you should
| stop) as pretty normal, but the latter (deciding the
| thing is okay) as heresy, the sort of thing that could
| get you the bell, book, and candle.
| paulddraper wrote:
| Yes. This is the Christian concept of faith and grace.
|
| "For by grace you have been saved through faith."
|
| Because of Christ's grace, your _belief_ is sufficient
| even if your _acts_ are not.
| barrysteve wrote:
| beliefs control acts.
|
| otherwise you're <insert name of belief>, in name only.
|
| mercy and justice are apprioriate outcomes for breaking
| the rules, not just 'yolo whatever i believe so
| everything is permitted'.
| paulddraper wrote:
| That's also true.
|
| There what someone believes, and what someone _says_ they
| believe.
|
| People are (ought to be) in state of continual
| improvement.
| tasuki wrote:
| I don't understand what you're saying.
|
| Don't you find it weird that doing the bad thing but
| agreeing that it is bad is... okay, while deciding the
| thing is okay is... heresy?
| true_religion wrote:
| I don't find it weird. If we acknowledge that people are
| imperfect, then everyone should understand they will fall
| short of their own moral standards.
| xyzelement wrote:
| It seems logical. Analogy: I want to be healthy but I am
| imperfect so I will end up over eating or skipping my
| workout. Versus: I embrace being unhealthy and fat as
| part of my identity.
|
| In one, you try to be better but aren't always
| successful. In the other, you've embraced the bad.
| paulddraper wrote:
| > I think poly relationships are very common.
|
| There is a difference between what things are common
| weaknesses and what things are social ideals. Just because
| sloth is not unusual, doesn't make it culturally
| acceptable.
|
| > looking at porn or thinking sexual thoughts about anyone
| else is engaging in a poly relationship.
|
| It is a poly relationship in your heart, which a step in
| the direction of an actual poly relationship.
|
| Lust/adultry, anger/assault, envy/theft, etc.
|
| "For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he."
| maeil wrote:
| > There is a common view of cultural norms as at worst
| tyrannical or at best random and arbitrary, rather than the
| sophisticated and curated product of billions of human lives.
|
| > Social iconoclasts dismiss organized religion, marriage,
| sexual norms, social duty, gender roles, and cultural
| traditions.
|
| Some of the cultural norms you named there are millions of
| years old and show little variance across cultures and time.
| Others only a few millennia old at best and show very high
| variance.
| [deleted]
| carapace wrote:
| > organized religion, marriage, sexual norms, social duty,
| gender roles, and cultural traditions
|
| Well, most of that is highly variable and contingent, local.
| Ask an anthropologist, they'll tell you.
|
| Personally, I don't think one should prescribe the "one true"
| form of family for other people.
|
| The question you raise in my mind is "What are you going to
| do to the non-conformists?"
| AlexandrB wrote:
| > Dismissing a multi-millenia multi-cultural fundamental norm
|
| This norm was not evenly distributed. Generally, if you were
| a peasant (and especially a woman), you were expected to
| adhere to the norms rigidly. While those with means or power
| frequently got to flaunt them or even started their own
| religions to get around them[1]. To me it just looks like
| another lever of control for the powerful over the "plebs".
|
| [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_England
| gmadsen wrote:
| society doesn't function if everyone is as ammoral as the
| elites
| JambalayaJim wrote:
| > There is a common view of cultural norms as at worst
| tyrannical or at best random and arbitrary, rather than the
| sophisticated and curated product of billions of human lives.
|
| Examine any of these "fundamental norms" and see that they
| were not so fundamental after all. With their narratives
| built to enforce cultural norms today, not genuinely explore
| lessons from the past.
|
| My grandma will _insist_ that homosexuality simply didn't
| exist when she was younger. This is the "sophisticated"
| product you speak of - a blatant denial of reality.
| lazide wrote:
| Nothing says fun times like pretending denial is a new -
| _or_ only an old thing.
|
| There are tradeoffs to every path, many only visible long
| after the path is taken.
|
| It's easy to reject the old path because the tradeoffs are
| visible and it's clearly not perfect.
|
| That doesn't mean the new path is going to be better - just
| less known.
| [deleted]
| flerchin wrote:
| Your argument was stronger before your quote of scripture, or
| whatever it was.
| paulddraper wrote:
| I don't want to plagiarize, but I can't think of a better
| descriptor of the cultural zeitgeist than "ever learning,
| and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth." (St
| Paul)
| defrost wrote:
| > Social iconoclasts dismiss organized religion,
| marriage, sexual norms, social duty, gender roles, and
| cultural traditions.
|
| It's important to recognise that western organised
| religion stomped on a great many multi-millenia gender
| roles and cultural traditions about the globe via
| colonisation.
|
| Promoting what might made right as "the norm" severely
| downplays the alternative collective learning of
| uncountable generations.
| gedy wrote:
| > It's important to recognise that western organised
| religion stomped on a great many multi-millenia gender
| roles and cultural traditions about the globe via
| colonisation.
|
| Sure, but let's be honest that the majority of humanity
| stabilized around a man and woman having children in a
| monogamous relationship, with a minority practicing
| polygamy. The rest were tiny outliers numbers wise.
|
| That's not quite the blank slate that some people imply
| humans are, imho.
| rayiner wrote:
| [flagged]
| rayiner wrote:
| Sorry, white people don't get to take credit for
| inventing monogamy. The basic sexual and gender roles are
| pretty consistent across Europe, the Middle East, India,
| China, most of Africa, etc. It's actually one of the main
| things we all have in common.
|
| You have to get into pretty small and obscure populations
| before you come across meaningfully "alternative"
| constructions.
| kibwen wrote:
| _> the collective learning of uncountable generations_
|
| Wisdom in one context can be foolishness in another. To live
| a good life it is necessary to re-evaluate the actions of
| your forebears and determine if it is still applicable to
| your modern context. That doesn't make someone a "social
| iconoclast", it makes them wise. Our ancestors did the same
| thing to their ancestors. Homo sapiens is 300,000 years old,
| and our societies have changed a lot since then, and will
| continue to change.
|
| Note that I personally have no desire to be anything other
| than monogamous, but I know several people (both young and
| elderly) who are successfully polyamorous. I also know people
| who have catastrophically failed at polyamory; but then, of
| course, I also know people who have catastrophically failed
| at monogamy.
|
| As far as I'm concerned, normalizing polyamory will
| strengthen monogamy. It seems like some people out there just
| aren't cut out for monogamy, and in a monogamous world they
| inevitably become cheaters. Let the polyamorous people remove
| themselves from the monogamous dating pool and you will
| exclusively remove people who would otherwise be compelled to
| cheat.
| orasis wrote:
| I like this take. Already you see specialization of dating
| apps toward different relationship styles, with Hinge more
| focused on Monogamy, Tinder on the casual/singles crowd,
| and Feeld for the nonmonogamous.
|
| I agree this is decidedly positive for the monogamous
| folks. There is now less risk of them connecting with and
| falling in love with someone who isn't a good match.
| rayiner wrote:
| In your example, there's a group of people who aren't cut
| out for monogamy and are a problem for society no matter
| what. But I think there's a much larger group of people
| that could do it in a society that offers them strong
| support and reinforcement, who will fail and flounder in a
| society that leaves them free to make choices.
|
| In my culture, neither divorce nor cheating are socially
| acceptable. Now, I'm happily married to my wife. But I'm
| also aware that I had better do everything I can to make my
| marriage happy, because that's it. My social standing would
| be devastated if I got divorced. People would be talking
| about me in hushed tones 12,000 miles away.
| kibwen wrote:
| _> In your example, there's a group of people who aren't
| cut out for monogamy and are a problem for society no
| matter what._
|
| To be clear, in my example, polyamorous people are only a
| problem for society because that society has decided that
| polyamorous people are a problem. I am advocating for
| basing our societal mores on reasonable consideration
| from first principles rather than simply tradition.
|
| _> But I think there's a much larger group of people
| that could do it in a society that offers them strong
| support and reinforcement, who will fail and flounder in
| a society that leaves them free to make choices._
|
| While it is certainly possible to argue against the
| notion of such-and-such freedom, this appears to be
| making the following argument: "it is possible to imagine
| that greater individual freedom will result in
| undesirable collective outcomes, therefore, all of our
| traditional restrictions on individual freedom are
| necessary and may not be challenged." I find this
| argument to be unconvincing.
|
| The support for this argument that you have given is of
| the general form: "I am incentivized to be a good husband
| because I would suffer socially if I were not; therefore,
| monogamy incentivizes positive relationships." I will
| counterargue that in a society where divorce is met with
| social ostracization, this _disincentivizes_ being a good
| spouse, because you know that your partner is stuck with
| you even despite your bad behavior. My in-laws are proof
| of this: my mother-in-law refuses to divorce for
| religious reasons, despite the fact that my father-in-law
| is both abusive and a proven cheater. Her misery and
| guilt over her husband 's infidelity does not benefit
| society in the least. And lest you think that this is a
| problem of society failing to properly ostracize the
| husband, rest assured that his children refuse to speak
| to him and he does not care in the slightest.
| rayiner wrote:
| [flagged]
| joshuamorton wrote:
| > I'm pretty sure that no kid has thought to themselves
| "I wish my parents had a bunch of unstable relationships
| with many different people."
|
| You're begging the question. Polyamory doesn't imply
| instability any more than monogomy does. I know people
| who have been in decades-long poly relationship.
|
| What I do see happen often in poly and poly-adjacent
| communities, especially those with children, is that
| children become a more communal responsibility, somewhat
| mimicking the effect of larger, multi-generational
| households you see in Asian and Hispanic communities,
| which usually leads to higher stability and better
| outcomes.
| smsm42 wrote:
| > To be clear, in my example, polyamorous people are only
| a problem for society because that society has decided
| that polyamorous people are a problem
|
| Any problem for the society is like that. You can say
| robberies are a problem only because society decided it
| is. That's how society works - there's no some external
| source where it could be checked, so the implication that
| it's arbitrary baseless decision because it is social is
| wrong - all rules of thd society are such, so if you want
| to have any rules at all, those would be the ones you'd
| have. It's impossible to have a society where everyone
| derives their morals from the physical laws anew all the
| time.
| smsm42 wrote:
| Reevaluate is fine, but I mostly see something like "oh
| it's all social construct" (somehow this implies it's
| worthless or even worse, oppressive) and that is considered
| enough to forego further consideration of comparative
| benefits. That's not evaluation, that's just hubristic
| dismissal.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| > Dismissing a multi-millenia multi-cultural fundamental norm
| as "indoctrination" severely downplays the collective
| learning of uncountable generations
|
| At many points in time this quote could easily apply to
| monogamous marriage, men having multiple wives and/or
| concubines, and consanguineous marriage.
| zrezzed wrote:
| > Dismissing a multi-millenia multi-cultural fundamental norm
| as "indoctrination" severely downplays the collective
| learning of uncountable generations.
|
| I agree in this case, but only because I think marriage is an
| institution that we've learned needs (sometimes strong)
| active endorsement and it's pro-social.
|
| My view is that cultural norms are at worst tyrannical and at
| best the essence of being human.
|
| > Social iconoclasts dismiss organized religion, marriage,
| sexual norms, social duty, gender roles, and cultural
| traditions.
|
| This is just true. But this is all of us: we all have a
| relationship with society around us and dismiss parts of it.
| As we should.
| User23 wrote:
| Polyamory is mainstream already and has been for some time.
| People just lie about it. Observably speaking the winner takes
| all high value men ploughing their way through the hookup
| marketplace while middling men settle for some combination of
| either sharing a woman, settling for a discarded older less
| fertile women, or picking single mothers with limited options
| at best dynamic is already operationally equivalent to old
| polygamous societies.
| charlie0 wrote:
| I'm not poly, but if I had to guess, the resurgence of that is
| the pendulum swinging back the other way against how atomized
| social media has made us. Many people, myself included, don't
| many or any friends. Poly is one way of closing that gap for
| those who are open minded and searching for deep familial like
| bonds.
|
| The coming advent of genetic engineering will make poly more
| interesting as it be possible for more than 2 people to be
| biological parents. In fact, we see this already in popular sci
| fi like The Expanse.
| barrysteve wrote:
| I would not want to live in a society where there is a large
| cohort of unmarried single men.
|
| Selfishness only works when other people can also be selfish.
| ChatGTP wrote:
| For the simple fact you can bring an STD home to your partner,
| it's not going to work in practice.
|
| "Honey, remember that mistress I was banging last month?"
|
| "Yes... darling"
|
| "She has HIV, you probably have it now too..."
|
| "Ok darling...no problems"
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Protection with non primary partners and STD testing (I'm a
| fan of monthly, YMMV). Some people take further steps (PrEP)
| depending on your activities and risk appetite. HIV
| transmission rates in hetero sexual activities is _very low_
| ( <1% per unprotected sexual exposure) [1].
|
| Infidelity rates in "monogamous" partnerships are already
| substantial (~10-25% depending on study) [2], poly only
| changes the honesty and logistics.
|
| [1] https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1254031
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infidelity#Incidence
| sarchertech wrote:
| You're comparing a monogamous relationship where there is a
| 10%-25% chance that one of you will have at least 1 extra
| partner, to a situation where at least one of you is
| regularly seeking out new partners. All else being equal
| the risk of contracting an STD is going to go way up.
|
| And there are other STDs to worry about than just HIV.
| Numerous drug resistant bacterial infections are on the
| rise.
|
| If the increased risk doesn't bother you, that's cool, but
| you can't pretend it doesn't exist.
| klyrs wrote:
| > where at least one of you is regularly seeking out new
| partners
|
| This isn't always the case. My sample is a bit biased as
| I rarely interact with cishet folks outside of work, but
| in my circle, quite a few nonmonogamous folks are quite
| stable with the 1-3 partners they have for years or
| decades at a time. As others point out, scheduling is a
| real limiter and unless you're just doing one-night-
| stands, it's easy to get "polysaturated" where, yeah,
| that boy looks cute but I don't have time for him. But
| what I _can_ do, that I couldn 't in a monogamous
| relationship, is come home and gush about the cute boy I
| flirted with.
| whaleofatw2022 wrote:
| Poly is for some just a scheduling fetish.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| I'm not pretending the risk doesn't exist. The data
| demonstrates the risk is low when safe sex is practiced.
| Practice safe sex and get tested often if you have
| multiple partners regularly.
| sarchertech wrote:
| I'm not talking about pretending the risk doesn't exist.
| I'm talking about pretending the increase in risk doesn't
| exist with
|
| > poly only changes the honesty and logistics
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Of all the monogamous people I know who have cheated on
| their partner, they are not practicing safe sex based on
| my inquires (but all have lucked out so far not getting
| pregnant or STD). I extrapolate out accordingly based on
| public STD health reporting and infidelity rates across
| the broader population.
|
| The data shows monogamy is aspirational, from a sexual
| perspective. Poly folks are more intentional about safe
| sex, at least in my experience.
|
| Of course, having no sex or being in a strictly
| monogamous relationship where you're 100% positive no one
| is being unfaithful is the lowest risk activity. But with
| 40% of pregnancies unintended annually in the US,
| infidelity rates, STD stats reporting from state public
| health systems, -\\_(tsu)_/-. I am a scholar basing my
| thesis on the data.
|
| (hard to take the monkey out of the human, we are simply
| fancy mammals)
| sarchertech wrote:
| > Of all the monogamous people I know who have cheated on
| their partner, they are not practicing safe sex based on
| my inquires
|
| > I extrapolate out accordingly
|
| > I am a scholar basing my thesis on the data.
|
| Those statements are entirely contradictory. Your
| methodology is not even remotely in the vicinity of
| scholarly.
|
| >The data shows monogamy is aspirational
|
| If 75-90% of monogamous relationships are successfully
| monogamous, I'd hardly call that aspirational.
|
| > But with 40% of pregnancies unintended annually
|
| Without know how many of those are monogamous couples,
| that statistic is useless.
|
| If you want to get pretty close to the actual risk
| difference, take a look at the difference in STD rates
| between single and married people. Even adjusting for
| age, race, and income, single people are astronomically
| more likely to contract STDs than married people.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| In my experience poly folks are way more ready and able to
| talk about this than mono folks. Regular testing and using
| barriers seems to be the baseline, while the nominally mono
| folks _don't_ deal with this because why should they,
| they're monogamous!
| whaleofatw2022 wrote:
| Yup. 'Paperwork' is fine to talk about in the poly world,
| as is honest communication about how to work around it.
|
| I've even had partners in the past with HSV1 or HSV2 and
| have tested negative for years after, because we were
| safe and worked around outbreaks.
| rayiner wrote:
| [flagged]
| jstarfish wrote:
| > I'd love to run an experiment where we send a bunch of poly
| people to a remote location and see if they can create
| civilization.
|
| Lmao. This has been tried and failed with every sex cult. The
| Children of God are the best (worst) example, having started
| during the free love era.
|
| It actually does hold itself together well enough, until the
| old guard gets bored and looks to the kids as their new
| source of sexual gratification.
| rswail wrote:
| Sorry, what? Why would you be sending a bunch of poly people
| anywhere?
|
| They exist as part of our culture and civilization. Is this
| some form of "the natural order of humankind is monogamous
| nuclear families"?
| rayiner wrote:
| Because I'm curious whether this is a pro-adaptive or mal-
| adaptive social construct. It's a purely utilitarian
| question: could a bunch of polyamorous people successfully
| survive in their own third world village? Would they raise
| healthy kids that would be able to create civilizational
| progress? I don't know the answer to that, hence the
| experiment.
| mturmon wrote:
| I'm personally curious if our cultural obsession with JS
| devs is pro-adaptive or mal-adaptive. The logical way to
| test this would be to send a bunch of JS devs to a
| Bangladeshi village and see if they survive.
|
| In other words, you can't really test a lot of social
| constructs in isolation.
| rayiner wrote:
| JS dev is a specialized trade that fills a social
| function within a larger society that needs many
| different kinds of jobs. Does polyamory serve such a
| specialized social function? Does society need any poly
| people at all? Like, if the world is ending and we need
| to send a 500 people to Mars to preserve humanity. What
| fraction of poly people do we need to bring to ensure the
| success of the mission?
| stompervitto wrote:
| I haven't seen any convincing arguments that polyamory does not
| reduce to a harem system[1]. 8000 years ago, 17 women
| successfully reproduced for every man who did[2]. In cultures
| with polygamy, this can be an advantage in warfare as there is
| a large body of excess young men to use as cannon fodder. But
| you could hardly argue that this compatible with the stable
| sorts of cultures most of the users of this site are more
| comfortable in. Giving men from the bottom 95% band of
| attractiveness access to reproduction via monogamy seems
| necessary to unlock the amount of productive labor needed for a
| technological society.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harem_(zoology)
|
| [2] https://psmag.com/environment/17-to-1-reproductive-success
| BobbyJo wrote:
| > I haven't seen any convincing arguments that polyamory does
| not reduce to a harem system.
|
| I haven't seen any convincing arguments that it does in
| humans. If women and men are equally polyamorous, that
| actually means more sex available broadly speaking, and when
| you aren't dating to reproduce or settle down forever, your
| standards can be looser as well.
|
| Now, I don't believe polyamory will ever be dominant, or even
| mainstream, I just despise the "loser need sex for cohesion"
| argument.
| barrysteve wrote:
| It's not loser need sex.
|
| It's loser need marriage.
|
| Somehow I think we've found the sticking point.
| est31 wrote:
| The harems are already here. The most attractive
| individuals among both men and women get a lot of attention
| from people attracted to them, and thus have their harems
| and can sleep around a lot (if they want to).
|
| Say the "successful on Tinder" group of 5%-er men who go to
| the gym nonstop, and have won the genetic lottery. There is
| also the "influencer" group of women with countless thirsty
| men in their DMs. Not every woman manages to become an
| influencer, but many are extremely beautiful.
|
| Are people in these harems happier being delulu than in
| some monogamic relationship? I'm not really sure.
|
| Industrialized society has managed to deliver lots of high
| quality products by replacing the human component with
| machines... relationships are something entirely between
| humans however, so they are hard to improve with
| industrialized processes. Until robotic
| girlfriends/boyfriends arrive of course :).
| lazide wrote:
| Women have strong biological incentives to have fewer
| partners, even with birth control - they are far more
| susceptible to sexually transmitted diseases, for one, as
| well as violence, and more partners means more risk of any
| one partner being a problem on that front. And all it takes
| is one.
|
| If resources are constrained, it's a toss up if it's better
| to have one dedicated partner with a strong bond, or
| multiple partners with weaker bonds. Depends I imagine on a
| lot of other dynamics, and if there are kids involved.
|
| There certainly are dynamics where many weaker bonded
| partners is worth the risk, or prostitution wouldn't be the
| world's oldest profession.
| hindsightbias wrote:
| Donors for IVF can get to 25 or so before they have to move
| to another area and start over.
| lazide wrote:
| For an example of what a society like this looks like now,
| there are a number of Muslim societies (and a few hidden
| corners in the US) that legalize polyamory.
|
| Notably, they follow pre-birth control setups and are male
| centered (one man, many wives), and do indeed exclude large
| swathes of men from the economy and relationships.
|
| One woman, many husband type setups are quite rare outside of
| nomadic/pastoral communities.
|
| As to with birth control? Harder to say.
|
| Many<->Many setups seem to have a lot of historical
| precedent, but mostly in societies without strong property
| rights (nomadic tribal) as they tend to be unstable over time
| and unpredictable. No large scale societies exist like that I
| am aware of.
| shrubble wrote:
| Society to survive over the long term, requires reproduction.
| Based on your knowledge, what is the reproduction rate of
| poly's?
| paganel wrote:
| > For my part, I'm happy to see polyamory becoming more
| mainstream
|
| Extremely bleak. The /redscarepod people, for all their
| minuses, are more than correct on this. I don't see any way out
| of this for the West, at least not in the short term.
| zem wrote:
| this is brilliant:
|
| 8<--------------------------
|
| The entire process was a series of tiny, painstaking tradeoffs.
| Each time I decided to make a question into a scale, this boosted
| the total time it took to complete the survey by a few seconds.
| And I had to care about those few seconds.
|
| In the end, the average time it took users to complete the survey
| was 40 minutes. This is really long for a survey! You really have
| to get people to care about it in order to finish.
|
| So: How do I get them to care?
|
| I decided to give users a score at the end -- How freaky are you
| compared to others?
| growingkittens wrote:
| > But this meant I needed to define fetish categories, and there
| is no good research on this anywhere. I had to invent them.
|
| This is a problem I see in many different domains. There will be
| lots of research papers, lots of small-scale categorization, but
| nothing that truly categorizes the whole subject.
| gizmo686 wrote:
| Minor point as the main body of the article doesn't attempt to
| answer it, but:
|
| > Why are there way more women interested in submission than men
| interested in dominance?
|
| In my anecdotal experience, there are more everyone interested in
| submission than dominance. And the gap between male subs and
| female doms is even greater.
| jncfhnb wrote:
| I feel like she points out a lot of reasonable constraints. I
| don't think she really overcomes many of them. You just won't get
| a reliable survey on such things. But that's ok. A sample of Vore
| fforumers is probably just as interesting as Vore festishists. I
| don't think it needs to generalize at all.
| InSteady wrote:
| There is basically never a perfect survey, but there is a lot
| of value in taking pains to not bias your sample (it allows you
| to tentitiviely draw certain types of conclusions that you
| otherwise absolutely cannot). Biased sampling happens
| constantly, it's a matter of degrees and often opinion whether
| a study should be considered able to draw a certain conclusion.
|
| IDK, it sounds like the author has taken quite a few steps
| beyond what your average social scientist does.. the vast
| majority of social science (and a fair bit from other
| categories) is insanely biased because its participants are
| 100% students at a specific college or region. Yet this is
| treated as perfectly acceptable because it's part of the norms
| of academic research.
| jncfhnb wrote:
| Like I said she acknowledges them but I don't feel she really
| addresses them sufficiently to make different claims. It's
| just not possible in a group this niche.
|
| Frankly I don't believe that fetishes are anything but
| learned associations so it's kind of silly to imagine the
| findings will generalize.
|
| She gets close to this idea in her survey design but I feel
| like she doesn't acknowledge this overall. Like, cake
| sitting. Dumb as hell. But sure I can see how it would lead
| people to shame or sensory triggers that they have learned on
| a second order to be arousing. And that after this they've
| become dependent on that specific thing even.
|
| But it's definitely not an intrinsic association.
| [deleted]
| monkeycantype wrote:
| not a response of the article - just a contribution to the
| conversation here: anyone into kink should be able to understand
| there is a complex relationship between constraint and freedom.
| Yes monogamy is as a constraint, but that constraint creates a
| space of freedom, in which people can reveal themselves honestly
| while minimizing any sense that anything revealed good or bad
| will be judged relative to alternative partners. Not everybody
| needs that, not everybody needs monogamy to create that dynamic,
| but it would be mistake to think that monogamy doesn't offer
| anything for thoughtful liberated people in exchange for the
| constraints it requires
| klyrs wrote:
| I tend to agree, monogamy is a kink.
| eszed wrote:
| I just took the survey, answering with complete and total
| honesty, and
|
| > Your kink equivalent is Mother Theresa (2nd percentile)
|
| LOL! I mean, I know I'm vanilla (a rich, complex, and expensive
| spice, I'll have you to know), but if Mother Theresa represents
| the 2nd percentile, who's the standard-bearer for 1st?
|
| My serious point is that I strongly suspect that people towards
| (ahem) _my_ end of the spectrum are likely to be under-
| represented among the takers of the survey. The people most
| likely to take a survey about kink are the people most into,
| well, kink. I don 't know how any survey design, no matter how
| good it is in a vacuum, can square that circle.
|
| (I say that with all possible respect for Aella and her work.
| I've followed her blog for ages - her essay about growing up
| within, and trying to shed, a fundamentalist upbringing is one of
| the best things I've ever read - and sexology research is
| fascinating. I just don't know how you can draw robust
| conclusions from survey data, given the social pro- and in-
| hibibitions most people have inherited.)
| slaw wrote:
| I got kinkness score -0.28 - Captain America, 0.5 percentile.
| HN readers must be very underrepresented.
| postmodest wrote:
| I would love to see their distribution.
| SergeAx wrote:
| There are negative values of kinkiness in that survey results.
| Before Mother Theresa are Bambi, Samwise Gamgee and Captain
| America. The most kinky character is Willi Wonka.
|
| https://twitter.com/Aella_Girl/status/1557815129584148482
| Aella wrote:
| You can make arguments about base rates here, but if nothing I
| think this gives decent data for comparative frequency. As in,
| it seems unlikely that any one particular fetish is
| overrepresented compared to others.
| Jedd wrote:
| If you read Christopher Hitchens' book The Missionary Position,
| you'll discover that Theresa was quite the sadist.
|
| https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/58664511-the-missionary-...
| 93po wrote:
| Claims of her sadism are wildly overstated and misrepresented
| hn_go_brrrrr wrote:
| I can't tell if this is a Mark Twain joke or if you've just
| declined to provide any support for your argument.
| 93po wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mother_Teresa#Criticism
| Jedd wrote:
| That short section of a wikipedia article could not be
| described as a comprehensive defence against the detailed
| criticisms levelled at her, especially those from Hitch.
|
| I have seen an attempted rebuttal around her behaviour,
| specifically responding to that book, but I suspect that
| piece was more an apologetic than an objective defence.
| richbell wrote:
| What specifically about that section did you want to
| share? Based on what I've read, the only defense is
| basically "she never said she was going to help people so
| you can't be mad".
| pclmulqdq wrote:
| When your survey on kinks is primarily shared by kinky people
| and on places like fetlife (the kinky social media), I would
| assume that the sample is somewhat biased.
| Aella wrote:
| I think it's prob slightly biased towards kinky people, but
| it wasn't primarily shared across fetlife. Most of the
| responses came from viral videos of people sharing their
| results on Tiktok.
| d0mine wrote:
| The article addresses your point in some detail.
| piroslav wrote:
| sample data based on clinical porn addicts isn't good
| representation of spciety, and thats one of the reasons why I
| ignore any """""research""""" she does.
| irrational wrote:
| > There were nearly 900 fetishes
|
| That is way higher than I would have expected. By at least an
| order of magnitude. Has she published a list?
| calciphus wrote:
| As always, there is a relevant XKCD
|
| https://xkcd.com/468/
| zoogeny wrote:
| I found this post on her substack:
|
| https://aella.substack.com/p/fetish-tabooness-and-popularity...
| paulddraper wrote:
| Pretty sure that list is uncountable.
|
| Somewhere there is someone whose fetish is peeled grapes.
| LoganDark wrote:
| > Somewhere there someone whose fetish is peeled grapes.
|
| I mean, why else would they perform surgery on one? The robot
| obviously has a thing for it.
| inhumantsar wrote:
| Rule 34 has enough evidence behind it to be considered a
| natural law at this point
| LoganDark wrote:
| Are kinks really that rare? Like, don't most people have
| _something_ that turns them on, in some way? Or does this article
| only refer to a very specific definition of "kink" past a
| certain degree of "freakiness"?
|
| If someone is turned on by cuddling or emotional bonding, are
| those kinks? I personally consider cuddling a kink. So does
| hugging, or holding hands, or whatever.
|
| Is this not a popular sentiment? Are kinks only things like
| vore..?
| InSteady wrote:
| Kink (regarding sexual preferences) is formally defined in
| various dictionaries as including a component of being
| uncommon, unconventional, etc. Holding hands, cuddling, and
| emotional bonding (along with kissing and various kinds of
| caressing) are probably among the most common sexual
| preferences on earth, so for kink to retain its semantic
| meaning they kind of have to be excluded. What you describe are
| sexual preferences, and perfectly valid ones! Just not kinks.
|
| That said, when people are casually or intimately discuss their
| sexual preferences, sometimes "kink" will be used as a
| substitute for the more cumbersome and clinical sounding
| "sexual preferences", so as long as contextual cues are good
| you are generally fine to give your preferences (when you are
| comfortable doing so).
|
| Kink is a fairly wide spectrum, because it turns out all kinds
| of random stuff turns people on when you are looking at large
| groups. Honestly, the kind of work the author/researcher is
| doing could go a long ways towards actually settling on some
| kind of formal delineation that isn't completely arbitrary (but
| still somewhat arbitrary of course). I gather vore is fairly
| unusual as far as kinks go, with things like spanking, foot
| fetish, leather, latex, etc, being more common but still not
| seriously appealing to the majority of people.
| LoganDark wrote:
| The clinical sounding thing doesn't actually sound quite
| right to me. "Kink" for me includes things that cause arousal
| for other reasons that aren't necessarily that. For example I
| have kinks that have absolutely nothing to do with
| penetration or even being in the context of any sort of
| sexual activity. They're just things I like in that way.
| InSteady wrote:
| Kinks and sexual preferences both include things that don't
| directly relate to sex. Not sure if this helps to clarify,
| but all kinks are sexual preferences but not all sexual
| preferences are kinks. Kind of like how all squares fit the
| classification of rectangles but rectangles are never
| squares by definition. As far as I can tell it is mostly
| about what is common and expected vs less common and less
| expected.
|
| It's not the most important distinction in the world IMO in
| common conversation. To social scientists and such like the
| author it is of course a fascinating distinction to dig
| into.
| LoganDark wrote:
| > rectangles are never squares
|
| If squares can be rectangles, rectangles can be squares,
| by virtue of happening to be a square that is also a
| rectangle. However not _all_ rectangles are squares.
|
| I suppose I get the point you're trying to make, but the
| bar of exactly what makes something a kink or not is
| something I don't really understand.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2023-10-07 23:02 UTC)